What are the main characteristics of a complex engineering project? The following list attempts to answer this question:

The business consists of discrete projects, such as build a chemical plant, or power station, or the manufacture of a high pressure boiler.

The equipment lists are extensive, sophisticated, and managed from design through erection as discrete items (frequently referred to as a “tagged item”.)

There are many engineering drawings and documents are created and progressed through a number of revisions. These drawings and documents are required to describe the project deliverables in infinite detail.

The design effort to prepare these drawings is usually extensive, multi-disciplinary, and requires very careful management and control of the man-hours.

Many of the engineering drawings have bills of material (both for standard and exotic materials), which have to be summarised and managed so that the material can be purchased in bulk, prior to fabrication or erection, and that shortages are identified early enough not to impact the erection schedule.

The procurement process is driven by the engineering schedule, which in turn is driven by the erection schedule. QC and Expediting are generally essential requirements.

Fabrication is generally per the engineering drawings developed specifically for the project. Fabrication is often contracted out but could also be done in-house

Erection is specific to the project.

The terms “capital project”, “turn-key project”, or “green field project” are often used as generic terms for this type of project.

The higher the degree of project complexity the better digiProjects will fit the requirement in comparison with traditional manufacturing systems.

HEAVY ENGINEERING

Turbines and Boilers (high pressure steam)

Ship building

Wind power farms

Research and development enterprises that design and then create experimental and pre-production models, for example, new model development at a car manufacturer

All manufacturing facilities that use the jobbing and batch manufacturing methodology